Former chief of security in Gaza and Palestinian leadership rival Mohammed Dahlan has 2 million euro of land outside Belgrade.

Former chief of security in Gaza and Palestinian leadership rival Mohammed Dahlan has 2 million euro of land outside Belgrade. HT: BalkanInsight.

A Serbian firm owned by the family of controversial Palestinian politician Mohammed Dahlan bought the 50 hectares of land along the Belgrade-Zagreb highway in 2006.

Public documents collected by Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BIRN) detail how Alfursan, owned by Dahlan’s brother and nephews, secured the 76 plots, worth approximately 2m euros.

The news emerges as Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas travels to Serbia on Tuesday and Wednesday to open a new embassy and meet top officials, including Serbian President Tomislav Nikolic.

Palestinian officials have been privately angered by Serbia’s decision to quietly grant citizenship to Dahlan, who is Abbas’ arch rival and was given a two-year jail term in absentia in May 2014.

The Serbian government’s decision to discreetly honour Dahlan and 11 other Palestinians connected to him in 2013 and 2014 attracted worldwide controversy after BIRN broke the story in February.

Foreign Minister Ivica Dacic argued that the award was motivated by Dahlan’s role in bringing investment from Abu Dhabi to the Balkan country.

But Palestinian officials believe that Dahlan, who rents a luxury villa in Belgrade, should return to his homeland and face the courts.

Dahlan rejects the allegations against him, saying they are part of a political plot to undermine his leadership challenge.

Before Dahlan was acting as a middleman for the Abu Dhabi royal family, and while he was still security chief for the Palestinian Authority, his brother Abdrabou established the real estate company Alfursan in 2006 in Belgrade.

Soon after he split ownership of his firm between himself and his sons, including Shadi Dahlan.

Shadi, who also received Serbian citizenship, runs a business in Montenegro owned by his famous uncle Mohammed called Levant International.

Dahlan also has good relations with Montenegrin Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic, who handed him citizenship in 2010.

Based on sale contracts, the land would have been worth around 2m euros in 2006, a figure which has not change significantly today.

He was cleared of corruption in Palestine in April this year when a judge in Ramallah ruled that his immunity as a public official had not been lifted. He had been accused of embezzling $18 million of public money, allegations he has denied. BIRN understands the Anti-Corruption Commission of Palestine is appealing the decision.

Officials from Palestine’s Anti-Corruption Commission have told BIRN that other investigations into Dahlan are ongoing, including a probe into his investments and money transfers in Serbia and Montenegro.

Akram Al-Khateb, deputy head of the commission, said: “Our job is to look for Dahlan’s money transfers to Egypt, Jordan, the Emirates, Serbia, Montenegro and all over.”

The former chief of security in Gaza became an adviser to the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, Mohammad bin Zayed, after he fled Palestine in 2011, when he was kicked out of the ruling Fatah party. He has been sentenced in absentia to a two-year jail term in May 2014 for defamation by a Ramallah court.